Teenage Drama
by Ms. Videl Son
Summary: OneShot, AU. “Why, thank you, Sasuke-kun! Hinata-chan, you’ll be part of Team Seven today,” Gai pronounced with finality. HinaSasuSaku. COMPLETE.


**Title:** Teenage Drama  
**Disclaimer: **What? Like _you_ own it?  
**Theme:** Triangulation  
**Rating:** G ( K ) – for, well, silly teenage drama.  
**Spoilers:** Sorry, not enough detail in here for you to get by in your Brit Lit class.

**Summary: **OneShot, AU. "Why, thank you, Sasuke-kun! Hinata-chan, you'll be part of Team Seven today," Gai pronounced with finality. HinaSasuSaku.

I've been procrastinating over in the DBZ section.

March contest entry for DateMe (though I don't like it very much).

* * *

Three...two...one...

Cue Sasuke.

As per his usual sense of impeccable punctuality, Uchiha Sasuke strolled through the auditorium door just as the late bell rang and class officially began. Dropping his backpack next to his chair at the front of the class with cool indifference to the clattering contents, he similarly slumped into his seat as the teacher positioned himself on the stage for his usual spiel.

'_Whatta_ _**hunk**_,' was Sakura's thought every morning as Sasuke took his assigned place in front of her, looking effortlessly suave and sexy. "Good morning, Sasuke-kun," she greeted, smiling coyly at the back of his spiky head.

"Morning," he replied without turning around.

Sakura sighed as the single word reverberated around in her mind like a ball bearing beating against the insides of a jingle bell. It was a special morning, indeed, when _the_ Sasuke deigned to say something to her outside of their group. '_And so __**smooth**__, too..._'

"Good morning, Sasuke-kun!" Ino – love rival and all around pig – also welcomed, batting her mascara-lacquered lashes at him from the center of the room.

"Hn," was all Sasuke responded to that.

Triumphantly, Sakura pivoted her body in her seat and stuck her tongue out at the meddlesome blonde. Ino responded in kind, pulling her lower eyelid down with her middle finger, as well.

_Ha_! Ino-pig was foiled this day. Sometimes she, too, was bestowed with a cursory acknowledgment, but Sasuke apparently found her unworthy of the effort for the moment.

His next words, unfortunately, were routinely uttered every morning. Of his own volition, too. "Morning, Hyuuga," he said, tilting his head slightly to cast his gaze over his shoulder at the statement's recipient.

Sakura, likewise, turned to look. Her glare was unforgiving.

"G-Good morning, Sasuke-san...," replied Hyuuga Hinata, bashfully inclining her head to him in a bow.

With a quick nod of reciprocation, Sasuke returned his face to its original straightforward position and placed his chin in the net of his intertwined fingers. The teacher was about to speak, after all, so any further conversation amongst students was sure to be drowned out.

"GOOD MORNING, CLASS!" shouted the teacher at the top of his lungs, his chipper mood creating dour expressions on the faces of his pupils.

"Good morning, Gai-sensei," Sakura and the rest of the class intoned with as little enthusiasm as feasible without being unconscious.

"What was that?" Gai replied to them all, cupping a hand around his ear. He leaned forward expectantly, flashing his sparkling grin at no one in particular. "I couldn't hear your youthful spirit!"

Sakura inhaled deeply and, after the customary three second delay, blared with the majority of her classmates, "GOOD MORNING, GAI-SENSEI!"

Sasuke, cool and unaffected as ever, hadn't joined in on the loud and unnecessary second greeting. Sakura felt a little embarrassed at having done so herself and hoped to any gods above watching that her one true love hadn't noticed (it wasn't as if she'd yelled _right_ in his ear, after all...).

Hinata -- ever the quiet little mouse -- had followed Sasuke's example and remained silent during the group display of "youthful enthusiasm." Sakura hoped that this, too, had escaped Sasuke's attention. She sadly doubted that it had, though.

With an approving thumbs-up to all of them, Gai praised, "_Much_ better!"

Class then proceeded in its usual fashion – roll first, homework discussion second and acting teams third – and passed by in a whirlwind of excited proclamations of future projects and dramatic renditions of classic monologues by Gai. All-in-all, boring compared to watching Sasuke's ribs expand and contract while he breathed.

"Okay, time to split up into our teams!" Gai finally exclaimed twenty minutes before the bell would release them to second period. "We don't have enough time to present today since my monologue ran a bit long, but you can discuss your performances for the beginning of next class. Ten minutes to settle on a scene from any Shakespearean tragedy you like and report to me!"

Out of the corner of he eye, Sakura could see Hinata's hand tentatively raise into the air. "Um...Gai-sensei, m-my team members are a-absent today."

"Both of them?" Gai replied, picking up the clipboard with the class roster attached to it from the stage floor. He scanned down the sheet, wooly eyebrows drawn together as he read the names. "You're right...Inuzuka-kun and Shino-kun are both on that judo club trip, aren't they?"

"Y-Yes, sir..."

"Very well, you can be part of someone else's group today," Gai decided, throwing the clipboard to the ground again now that its usefulness had been outlived. "Any volunteers?"

Turning in Ino's direction, Sakura began signaling wildly to her. With Naruto also missing (probably suspended again), there was a slot open in Team Seven for Hinata and, if the bashful heiress and Sasuke were to ever spend any amount of significant time together...well, it would be bad for Sasuke fangirls everywhere, to put it bluntly.

Shikamaru was (blessedly) on the same trip as Kiba and Shino, acting as team manager or...something, giving Ino the opportunity to save them all from certain romantic doom. If only she would _stop_ _brushing her damned hair _and pay attention!

"Come on, guys! Hinata-chan is in desperate need of a couple of partners," Gai scolded the class, wagging a scornful finger at the lot of them. "Isn't anyone willing to open their heart to her?"

Finally, Ino noticed Sakura's frenzied hands. She raised a perfectly styled eyebrow at her pink-haired classmate as if to say, "what do you want?"

Pointing first to Hinata, then back to Ino, Sakura hoped that the blonde would catch on. She repeated the motions twice over just in case.

It wasn't working, however, so Sakura added an incline of the head to Sasuke to her mixture of signals. Finally, Ino seemed to take the hint and her eyes grew wide with understanding.

Just as the blonde's hand was rising into the air, a voice spoke up on Hinata's behalf; "She can join our group."

Too late.

"Why, thank you, Sasuke-kun! Hinata-chan, you'll be part of Team Seven today," Gai pronounced with finality. "Okay, get into your groups!"

Sakura and Ino both banged their heads against their individual desktops in defeat. Curses, foiled.

"Th-Thank you for letting me into your group," was the first thing that Hinata said as she pulled her desk up to Sakura's. Sasuke joined them a second later, attaching his workspace to both of theirs.

"It was nothing," Sasuke replied, averting his eyes from her.

"Y-Yeah," Sakura agreed, forcing what she hoped would be taken for a genuine smile. "Nothing."

"So...which scene should we do?" Hinata asked, apparently oblivious to the tension her presence caused within the group.

"How about the balcony scene from _Romeo and Juliet_?" Sakura suggested, turning away from Hinata to face Sasuke. His approval was necessary, after all. "It's such a romantic play, don't you think, Sasuke-kun?"

Sasuke snorted a laugh. "Romeo was on the rebound and Juliet wasn't old enough to know what she wanted. They were idiots." ( 1 )

"I don't know...," Sakura began, still hoping to persuade Sasuke without outright disagreeing with him. If she could swing a romantic interlude between herself and her object of affection, Hinata might be forgotten altogether. It could even be plausible to get a _kiss_ for her troubles. "I think love at first sight is _very_ powerful," she finished, fluttering her eyelashes for emphasis.

"Besides the fact that the play is based on infatuation and not love, there are three of us and not enough characters in the scene," Sasuke correctly observed.

"Hinata-chan could be the nurse," Sakura suggested, folding her arms beneath her bust and tilting her body forward.

"I'd rather do something from _Hamlet_," declared Sasuke, leaning back in his chair and away from Sakura. "What do you want to do, Hyuuga?"

Hinata, apparently startled to be included in the conversation, suddenly sat straight up in her seat and blushed. "I'm f-fine with whatever you decide to do..."

Sasuke frowned and, for the first time since their group was collected together, looked directly at her. "I asked what _you_ wanted to do."

"Oh, um...w-well..."

Sasuke brought himself forward again, propping his torso up on his desk with his crossed forearms. "Which tragedy do you like best, Hyuuga?"

"_K-King Lear_...," Hinata finally admitted, looking down at her desk as she began poking he fingers together.

With all that cutesy blushing, Sakura was beginning to suspect that Hinata liked Sasuke after all. What happened to that pathetic crush she had on Naruto?

"That works for me," Sasuke said, shifting his eyes to focus on Sakura. "What about you?"

"Uh...," was all Sakura could immediately think to utter. Should she try to press once more for her kissing scene? Or blindly agree with Sasuke like always? "I guess that's...okay..."

"Good, I'll go tell Gai," Sasuke said, pushing his chair back so that he could stand up. "Act V, scene iii fine?" ( 2 )

"Perfect, Sasuke-kun!"

"Yes, it's fine..."

Sasuke strolled away, purposefully making his way towards Gai. This left Sakura alone with her true rival.

Hinata had won this battle, but Sakura would prevail in the oncoming war.

* * *

**Footnotes: **

( 1 ) Though most people consider _Romeo and Juliet _to be the most romantic story ever, I'm inclined to disagree based (primarily) on two facts: 1 ) Romeo had literally just been dumped by another woman, Rosaline, who told him that he was too immature to understand love and 2 ) Juliet was only about fourteen-years-old. Does that sound like love or infatuation to you?

( 2 ) Act V, scene iii of _King Lear _– this is the point at which King Lear (the protagonist) and his formerly disowned daughter, Cordelia (who is the only loyal daughter out of three), are captured as war prisoners by the antagonists of the play. At the very beginning of the scene, Lear describes a fantasy about him and Cordelia living alone together like birds in a cage (this reminds me more of NejiHina, particularly considering the familial ties, but I figure it would speak to Hinata either way).

For more detail, please read the play yourself and/or look up the cliffsnotes on SparkNotes. com.

Btw, I chose King Lear as Hinata's favorite Shakespearean tragedy because of the familial conflicts. Who can guess why Sasuke wanted _Hamlet_ and Sakura _Romeo and Juliet _(those should be more obvious)?

**Author's Notes:** My March contest entry for DateMe (find the link to the group in my profile).

I have NO idea why I went with Shakespearean drama as my secondary theme, but that's what came to me as I got started. Maybe it's because I'm taking a break from my Brit Lit homework...?

Either way, I noticed that nobody has done a triangle involving a male love interest and a rival for Hinata, so that's why I chose HinaSasuSaku.

I haven't written in Sakura's POV much before (just for a few chapters of "Speak Up"), soo...yeah. Tell me where I can improve.

_**. ( . Ms Videl Son . ) .**_

– _Love can be black and white. SasuHina._


End file.
